


everybody's changing (and i don't feel the same)

by oryx



Category: Kamen Rider Gaim
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-08
Updated: 2015-04-08
Packaged: 2018-03-21 20:41:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3704335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oryx/pseuds/oryx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five more times Kouta visits his dream, and one time he visits Kouta's.</p>
            </blockquote>





	everybody's changing (and i don't feel the same)

**Author's Note:**

> i began with a simple thought: "hmm, i really like the idea of kouta having a hard time adjusting to godhood"  
> somehow along the way everything spiraled wildly out of control & became way more angsty & overwrought than intended, but that's just the way it goes, i guess

He closes his eyes and he’s once again standing on that same driftwood-strewn beach, the rocky cliffs looming on both sides, the muted light still turning everything to soft, pink-ish shades.  
   
“You must really like this place,” he says, and glances over just in time to see Kouta laugh, rubbing at the back of his neck sheepishly.  
   
“I guess? I mean, it’s a place we took a trip to, back before my parents died. I was pretty young, so I don’t remember it all that well. The real beach… probably wasn’t anywhere near this nice.” He stares out at the expanse of glittering ocean, mouth curving into a contemplative frown. “And I guess this is kinda dull. The same place as last time. I should switch things up, right?”  
   
He snaps his fingers and the scenery changes, to a low, windswept field that stretches for miles in all directions, the clouds seeming to touch the horizon in the distance. Takatora looks down to see brightly coloured wildflowers all around him, and takes care not to crush them as he takes a step closer to Kouta.  
   
“This is… even more adorable.”  
   
“Oh, come on,” Kouta says with a grin. “I’m a romantic guy, alright? I like pretty scenery as much as the next person.”  
   
Takatora feels something twist inside him as he stares at that smile, and he looks away, focusing instead on the shapes of the clouds in the distance.  
   
“My dream again?” he says. “No one else you want to visit?”  
   
“Y’know, it’s weird.” Kouta folds his arms across his chest, brow furrowing thoughtfully. “I tried to visit my sister and Micchi, but they didn’t get it. That it was actually me, I mean. They thought they were just dreaming me. And with everyone else, I can watch from the sidelines but I can’t really… get involved. I wonder why you’re different?”  
   
“I wonder,” Takatora says. He’s smiling, but there’s a hollow, half-hearted feeling to it. “You know, I went out with your sister again the other day.”  
   
“Really?” Kouta’s eyes go wide. “So you two are…?”  
   
“No.”  
   
“Well why not?” he asks, looking almost indignant.  
   
Takatora huffs out a quiet laugh. “Not that she isn’t a wonderful woman. But I look at her, and I see less a person I’d like to be with, and more… the person I wish I was.”  
   
Kazuraba Akira had no family fortune to spend, no maids or chefs or private tutors, no elite private schools begging the attendance of _her_ baby brother. And yet somehow, she raised this person – who even now, with the power of creation at his fingertips, stands side-by-side with Takatora and talks with him like nothing has changed.  
   
Kouta is giving him an odd look, and he hastily continues:  
   
“And I have someone else. Someone else I’m interested in.”  
   
“What, seriously?” Kouta says, leaning in a little closer with a furtive smile. “Who is it?”  
   
Takatora pretends not to hear him.  
   
“Maybe,” he says, and bends down to pluck a single, tiny orange flower from the soil at his feet. He holds it up to the sunlight, admiring for a moment how real it looks, each petal slightly imperfect and distinct. And then he lets it go, watching it float away on the breeze.  
   
“Maybe next time, someplace a little less windy would be nice.”  
   
  
   
  
   
He closes his eyes and he is standing on a street he’s never seen before, uneven stone paving beneath his feet and antiquated white-washed buildings surrounding him, their walls laced here and there with ivy.  
   
“Definitely less windy, right?”  
   
He turns to find Kouta grinning at him, and is taken aback for a moment by how brilliant that smile is. The Kouta his mind conjures up in his day-to-day dreams pales in comparison to the real thing.  
   
“What is it?” Kouta is saying, his sunny expression faltering a bit. He gestures at their surroundings. “Is this no good?”  
   
“No,” Takatora says. “It’s just… it’s been six months,” (and seventeen days), “since I saw you last. I thought you might be gone for good.”  
   
“… Six months?” Kouta echoes. His smile fades a little more, then, surprise and confusion gradually giving way to a tired sort of resignation. There’s a bench nearby – was it there before? Takatora isn’t sure – and Kouta walks over, sinking down on to it slowly.  
   
“Y’know,” he says, “Mai keeps telling me: ‘Time is different for us now.’ But I still just… don’t really get it. I’m still stuck on hours and days and weeks, even though none of it matters out where we are. I still think about Mai’s birthday coming up. But I guess I missed it, if it’s been six months.” He tilts his head back to stare up at the sky. “Maybe I’m not really cut out for this ‘First Man’ business.”  
   
“I imagine most people would have difficulty adjusting,” Takatora says, joining him on the bench.  
   
“You think? Mai seems like she was meant for it, though.” Kouta laughs, quiet and fond. “Being a goddess. She just has that air about her, you know? But me, I’m just…”  
   
He trails off, searching for the right words, but in the end merely shakes his head as if to clear the thoughts away.  
   
“How’s Micchi doing?”  
   
“… He’s better. He told me that you spoke to him when you visited. Whatever you said… It seems to have done him some good. He still hasn’t gone back to dancing, but Zack tells me that he watches from the audience rather than from a distance these days. I suppose that’s progress.”  
   
“You talked to Zack?” Kouta says, eyes brightening. “How is he?”  
   
Takatora can feel an amused smile tug at the corner of his mouth as he settles in to inform Kouta of everything he’s missed. Everything he knows, that is. Takatora doesn’t count himself as a terribly social type, and he’s been busy lately, rebuilding all the things that were lost. But the people who remember Kouta and Mai have a strange way of crossing paths, it seems. He can’t go anywhere in Zawame without finding himself face to face with someone else who was there – who knows just how close humanity came to annihilation. They all have a certain look about them, he’s found. A sad kind of gratefulness.  
   
As he tells Kouta about the festival that was held recently in the field surrounding that strange, ancient-looking tree, he realizes something. The sun, which before had been moving at a realistic pace across the sky, has been just on the verge of setting for quite a while now.  
   
As if someone were purposefully holding it in place, unwilling to let this moment end.  
   
  
   
  
   
He closes his eyes and he is on a familiar bridge on the south side of Zawame, one he crosses often, only it seems strange, somehow. Unfinished. The textures flat and the colours different from how he remembers them. When he looks up at the sky the grey clouds look warped, the distant city skyline seeming to taper away into nothingness.  
   
“Takatora,” that familiar voice says, and he takes a sharp breath as he turns to meet him, because it’s been a year and three months since he last saw Kouta’s face, and –  
   
Kouta is crying. His cheeks are wet, eyes glassy and rimmed with red. (And yet there’s a glow to them that isn’t quite human, and when he moves his edges seem to blur, fading soft into the city behind him.)  
   
“Hey, Takatora,” he says, and smiles weakly as he reaches out to touch Takatora’s wrist. His fingers feel like warm light against his skin. “You believe that things can change, don’t you? I… I changed things once before. Why not the past, too? Why not this?”  
   
“Kouta? What are you – ”  
   
He’s cut off as Kouta steps forward, grabbing him by the collar and pulling him down into a kiss. Takatora stands there in shock for a moment before relaxing into it, putting a hesitant hand on Kouta’s waist. It’s urgent and desperate and Kouta’s lips taste like salt and yet somehow it still feels a bit like kissing air, his presence here tenuous like it’s never been before.  
   
Takatora wonders, distantly, why he doesn’t feel happy. This is what he wanted, isn’t it? This is what he’s imagined countless times, distracting himself with thoughts of how it might be.  
   
But something about this moment is wrong in every way.  
   
Kouta puts his hands on Takatora’s chest and pushes away from him abruptly, staring up at him with an expression that’s almost horrified.  
   
“I – I’m sorry,” he whispers, shaking his head as he backs away.  
   
“I’m sorry,” he says again, and the words seem to hang in the air, echoing again and again, even as the dream begins to crumble and collapse around them.  
   
  
   
  
   
He closes his eyes and he is standing in front of a run-down shrine, paint peeling away from worn old wood, the bell rusted with age and the rope frayed around the edges.  
   
Someone claps, and he turns to find Kouta there next to him, eyes closed as he prays. His arm is brushing Takatora’s shoulder, and he marvels at the closeness of it. At how easy it feels.  
   
It’s been a year and ten months since he last saw Kouta.  
   
“This is quaint,” he says, and Kouta smiles faintly as he opens his eyes.  
   
“Back when our parents died, we stayed with our grandma for a little while. This place was right behind her house. I always came here when I felt like crying, because I didn’t want nee-san to see.”  
   
The image of Kouta on that bridge, eyelashes wet and dark as he leans in close, has long since burned itself into Takatora’s mind, and he finds himself thinking of it again now. Is he pretending that nothing’s wrong? Or maybe… Maybe Takatora’s hypothesis really is true: that from Kouta’s perspective, the kiss has yet to happen.  
   
“I guess I’ve just… been feeling kinda nostalgic lately,” Kouta is saying. “Mai keeps telling me off. She says I spend too much time looking back when I should be looking forward.” He laughs, but the sound rings hollow. “She’s probably right.”  
   
Takatora studies his face for a moment. He looks tired, somehow, in a way that a god probably shouldn’t.  
   
“The future of your world,” Takatora says. “You’re not interested in seeing it?”  
   
“I am,” Kouta says, after a contemplative pause. “But… I feel like I missed a lesson somewhere. ‘How to forget being human.’” He sits down on the shrine steps and makes a frustrated noise as he runs a hand through his hair. “I don’t know how Mai managed it. I asked her a few weeks ago and she just said ‘it’s not our world anymore.’ Like it’s that simple. Every day I wonder how Team Gaim is doing, and if Jounouchi is still working at Oren’s, and if nee-san is lonely without me in the apartment. How am I supposed to stop thinking about those things? How am I supposed to just put them aside?”  
   
That, Takatora doesn’t know how to answer. Kouta always struck him as the type who loved _people_ dearly – loved being around them, and having their attention, and watching them return his smiles. To suddenly be separate, to be the Other… It must have hurt him then, and even more now, with even the ability to observe from afar slowly fading.  
   
Instead of words, he simply puts a hand on Kouta’s shoulder. Kouta hesitates for a second before reaching up to cover his hand with his own – a solid weight, so unlike the last time – and they stay that way for a time, neither of them saying anything.  
   
Until Kouta finally notices the band of cool metal beneath his palm. He holds Takatora’s hand up and blinks at it like he’s never seen a ring before.  
   
“I got engaged recently,” Takatora says. “You’d like her, I think. She was a Beat Rider up until a year ago.”  
   
(It’s uncanny, actually, how much Ran resembles Kouta, but he tries to think about _that_ as little as possible.)  
   
Kouta looks, for a split second, like he’s been slapped across the face. There’s shock and pain there, but perhaps Takatora’s just imagining it, as it fades away as quick as it came, replaced instead by a broad grin.  
   
“Seriously?” he says, getting to his feet and clapping Takatora on the shoulder. “Congratulations, man. I’ll bet that’s who you were talking about before, right? The person you were ‘interested in.’”  
   
He takes his hand away, but Takatora can still feel the place where he touched, still conscious of exactly where Kouta’s fingers brushed his arm.  
   
He forces a smile and does not answer.  
   
  
   
  
   
He closes his eyes and he is standing in the garage that Team Gaim used to call its base – a place he visited only once, but somehow still remembers vividly. The garage was bought a few years back, he knows, turned into a fitness club or a rec center or something of that nature, but here in the dream everything is exactly as it was. Still bright and colourful, with their team photo still hanging undisturbed on the wall.  
   
“You look different,” that voice says, and he glances over to find Kouta on the swing, frowning up at him as he aimlessly pushes himself back and forth.  
   
“And you still look the same,” Takatora says. Strange, he thinks. Where looking at Kouta’s face used to truly hurt, now there is only a dull ache. The distant echo of a sound that used to be much louder.  
   
“What do you mean ‘still’?” Kouta laughs. “It hasn’t been _that_ long since you saw me last.” When he receives nothing but a sad stare in return, his smile falters. “…Right?”  
   
“I could round it down to six years for you, if you’d like,” Takatora says. _Though it’s actually closer to seven._  
   
Kouta comes to an abrupt halt mid-swing. His eyes are suddenly very wide.  
   
“That’s not – ” he says, and breaks off, shaking his head in disbelief. “That’s not possible.”  
   
There are so many things that Takatora could say. _I went to your sister’s wedding last April. It seems she found someone who will make her happy._ Or: _Mitsuzane is almost finished with his residency. He’ll be a doctor soon enough._ Or: _My wife and I divorced a few months back. We both had things from our pasts that we couldn’t quite let go of._  
   
But what good would it do? Informing Kouta of all the day-to-day life he’s missed out on felt reasonable at one point, but now seems more cruel than anything. And so he stays silent, and watches as Kouta begins to pace back and forth in front of him, fists clenched tight at his sides.  
   
“I know I’ve been losing track of time lately,” he says, his words measured, like he’s trying to reason with himself. “But _six years_? That’s just… How could it have been that long? How could I have…”  
   
He stops his anxious pacing and almost seems to wilt, then, shoulders slumping low.  
   
“But I guess it makes sense,” he says softly. “I haven’t been able to visit anyone’s dreams lately, other than yours. And even this,” here he gestures at the dream around them, “was harder to create than it used to be. Like the connection isn’t as strong, or something. I guess I… can’t really blame anyone for forgetting me, if it’s been that long.”  
   
“No one is forgetting you,” Takatora says.  
   
(Akira at the reception, looking beautiful in her mother’s dress, saying “to my brother” as she raised her glass. Mitsuzane on the phone just a few days ago, saying “I wish Kouta-san were here to see this” with a wistful sigh. Ran smiling at him tiredly from across the table, saying “we’re both idiots, aren’t we? Still hung up on the ones who got away.”)  
   
“We’re all just getting farther away from each other,” he continues. “You in particular.”  
   
Kouta says nothing – merely lowers his eyes, the line of his jaw taut with tension. Takatora can guess what he must be thinking. Maybe it would be better to be forgotten, rather than to know that people are missing you and yet be unable to return to them.  
   
“You know, I have a daughter,” Takatora says.  
   
Kouta turns to stare at him in astonishment.  
   
“Haruka. She’s four years old now. She loves anything to do with outer space – planets and stars and things like that. I told her that there’s a planet out there, similar to Earth but different. I told her… that the people who made it that way are old friends of mine.”  
   
Kouta looks, in this moment, like he’s about to cry. “A daughter,” he says, and there’s something reverent about the way he speaks that word. He smiles sadly. “I wish I could meet her. I really wish I could – ” Here his voice breaks, and he tries valiantly to keep that smile from wavering.  
   
“I know,” Takatora says. “I’m sorry.”  
   
He reaches out, hesitant, to put a hand on the back of Kouta’s neck, pulling him in close in some semblance of a hug. He’s never been any good at this. Physical affection, that is. But if not now, he thinks, then when? Maybe this will be the last time. Maybe he will never have another chance.  
   
Kouta leans into him, and rests his forehead against his shoulder, and they stay that way as little by little the dream fades away into black.  
   
  
   
  
   
He closes his eyes and he is there again, in Helheim, with fog twisting around his ankles and trees closing in on every side, and fear sets in for a moment before he realizes that it isn’t actually happening. It’s been so long since he last had one of these dreams. He’d forgotten how real they felt.  
   
“I’m amazed you would want to come back here,” he says, and glances over at Kouta.  
   
(He still doesn’t look a day over twenty, and that shouldn’t be surprising but it _is_ , somehow. “Jarring” might be a better word for it. The years since Kouta left keep passing, and Takatora feels the weight of those years getting heavier each day, but there is Kouta, looking exactly as he did then, and suddenly it feels like it was only yesterday.)  
   
Kouta blinks at the forest around them like he’s only now seeing it. “You know,” he says, “I didn’t even think about it. I guess I just… brought us here unconsciously. I wonder why?” He looks over at Takatora, then, studying his face, his expression slowly darkening. “How long has it been this time?”  
   
Takatora raises an eyebrow. “Are you saying I haven’t aged well?”  
   
That gets a laugh out of Kouta, small and sad though it might be, and Takatora wonders if this is the end. Is it finished now? Has he moved on, if he can stand here and make jokes and feel only the faintest twinge of bitterness?  
   
“Well,” Kouta says a moment later. “I guess it doesn’t matter so much. Because I realized something a little while ago.” Here his eyes brighten. “I can just give the Fruit away. I can go back and give it to someone else – someone who wants it. Someone who’ll do the same thing that me and Mai did. And then I can be normal again.”  
   
Takatora stares at him, a sense of unease beginning to creep slowly up his spine. His skin is starting to prickle.  
   
“You can’t be serious,” he says.  
   
“I am,” Kouta insists, taking a step closer, and there’s a manic edge to his smile. “I’m not meant for this, Takatora. Something must’ve gotten messed up along the way, don’t you think? Sagara kept talking about ‘fate’ but… fate can be wrong, can’t it? This has to be some kind of mistake. I mean, I’m not supposed to be a – a _god_. I’m just a person. I’m just – ”  
   
His voice catches as he takes another step closer, as he reaches up to touch Takatora’s cheek.  
   
“It doesn’t have to be like this,” he says, with a desperate kind of conviction. “I can change everything. I can go back to being human, and you and me… we can…”  
   
There are images in Takatora’s mind, then. Thoughts that aren’t his own (but they easily could be). Snapshots of a life they never got a chance to have. Lying in that hospital bed and opening his eyes to find Kouta there too, right next to Mitsuzane. Looking over the parts of Zawame still abandoned and strewn with rubble, and feeling Kouta’s hand slip into his. Waking up next to him in the morning. Arguing with him about trivial things. Attending Akira’s wedding together, and this time Kouta is there to walk his sister down the aisle –  
   
“Stop it,” he says, his voice raw and hoarse, pushing Kouta’s hand away. “It’s over, Kouta. It was over from the beginning. There’s nothing we can do, so just… Please. Stop.”  
   
Kouta stares at him like he can’t quite comprehend his words. “Isn’t this… what you want, too? Don’t you want things to change?”  
   
“It isn’t – it isn’t about what I _want_. The past can’t just be erased like that. You can’t rewrite what’s already happened. You know that.”  
   
Kouta’s hand curls into a fist against Takatora’s chest. “Then what’s the point? What’s the point of being like this if I can’t _do_ anything?” His voice is getting louder, ringing in Takatora’s ears. “I can make a new world but I can’t even change my own life?” He laughs bitterly, trying to blink away the tears threatening the corners of his eyes. “It’s time, isn’t it? All this time has made you different. Twenty years ago you would’ve understood. Twenty years ago…”  
   
A thought seems to dawn on him, and he takes a step back with a hollow smile.  
   
“You _will_ understand,” he says as he fades away, and the dream of Helheim shatters like a broken mirror.  
   
  
   
  
   
  
   
He closes his eyes and all around him there is nothing but white.  
   
_Where would you like to go this time?_ Kouta’s voice asks. _Your choice._  
   
Takatora ponders for a moment. “How about your dream?”  
   
A quiet laugh, which seems to echo from every direction. _I don’t sleep much anymore._  
   
“I know. I mean your dream. Yours and Mai’s.”  
   
_Ohh, I get it._ There’s a smile in his voice. _As you wish._  
   
He snaps his fingers and they are standing at the top of a cliff overlooking a wide valley. The sky is completely obscured by clouds in a strange, opaque shade of pale green, hanging low and flat overhead, seemingly close enough that you could reach up and touch them. The scrubland down below is a dusty pink, the sparse plant life growing there bearing a closer resemblance to coral than to any plants Takatora has ever seen. In the distance there are signs of civilization – a primitive caravan, of some sort – and the silvery stripe of a river beyond that, twisting its way across the horizon.  
   
“This is how I imagine it’ll be, in a few… hundred years, maybe. Not that ‘years’ mean the same thing here, but. You know.”  
   
Takatora glances over, expecting to see white-blond hair and gleaming silver armor, but Kouta is still as he was. Jeans and a Team Gaim sweatshirt and dark hair in disarray. A memory preserved in time. (The light behind his eyes seems to have gotten brighter, though. That much has changed.)  
   
“Maybe? Can’t you look into the future to make sure?”  
   
“Well, I guess I could. But I’d only be seeing the most likely outcome.” He turns to Takatora with a smile. “That’s the thing about the future. It’s not set in stone just yet.”  
   
“Unlike the past?”  
   
Kouta’s smile turns somewhat rueful, then. “Unlike the past.”  
   
“I… used to think this was all wrong,” he continues. “Because I couldn’t forget. Because I still had regrets and things like that. And I still feel really… _mundane_ sometimes. Too average for all this.” He stares out at the landscape beneath them, frowning thoughtfully. He snaps his fingers again, and suddenly they are down below in the valley, with arid rock and sand beneath their feet – not only pink but also faded orange and yellow, if you look close enough. “But maybe that’s for the best? Maybe this planet will be better off for it. Looking from above doesn’t always give the best view, right?”  
   
Takatora can feel his mouth curve into an amused smile. “I could’ve told you that a long time ago,” he says, and Kouta laughs.  
   
For a time they lapse into silence. And then:  
   
“Someday this place will die,” Kouta says. “Not for ages. But it will. And Mai and me… we’ll die with it, probably, if we aren’t already gone before. So maybe… in another life, yeah? I’ll see you again.”  
   
There’s a tight feeling in Takatora’s chest as he nods.  
   
“In another life,” he says, as if it were a promise.  
   
Kouta leans in to press his lips to Takatora’s forehead, and it feels a bit like stepping into sunlight.


End file.
